


Every Night

by parttimehuman



Series: Rarepair Galore [19]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, First Kiss, Forgiveness, Getting Together, Guilt, Light Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-02 07:09:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18806233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parttimehuman/pseuds/parttimehuman
Summary: He used to side with the bad guys. Trying to save his town from monsters, he became one himself.Every day, he tries his hardest to move on from his past.Every night, he crumbles.





	Every Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [snaeken](https://archiveofourown.org/users/snaeken/gifts).



Every day, he manages somehow. Every morning, he gets out of bed. He makes coffee and he goes to work. He can’t look in the mirror, but he can function. He can do what’s asked of him, and he can do it well. Sometimes, he can even close his eyes for a while and take a nap. Sometimes, it’s almost okay enough to forget. 

 

Every night, he crumbles. 

 

When the sun has set and the stars twinkle above his head, after the world has gone silent and there’s nothing left to get done, that’s when he knows how alone he really is. 

 

He goes outside like his mom has always warned him not to, walking in the middle of the street like he has a death wish, but he’s done this enough times to know he’ll be safe. He didn’t think to take a thicker jacket with him, and the wind brushing through his hair and cooling his skin feels good. 

 

He needs to get away. Away from the house that doesn’t feel like a home, from the eyes that could but simply will not see him, from the lives he doesn’t belong in. He needs to go to the only place in Beacon Hills where being alone feels like the right thing. He’s invisible anyway, but maybe, maybe, if he hides on purpose, he can feel lucky for not ever being found, not ever being seen. 

 

In another life, he was someone. It wasn’t really another life, it was less than two years ago, but the whole world has changed in the meantime. Nolan has changed. He was his parents’ pride, at first. Their golden boy, whose lacrosse trophies they kept on a shelf in the living room. A good student, too. Smart, resourceful, ambitious.  _ ‘This kid is going places,’  _ they used to say. 

 

Nobody tells a kid that the places they go can be dark ones, and nobody shows them the way. 

 

When his parents’ pride wasn’t enough anymore, he tried it elsewhere. He joined clubs, started looking for right people. People with a mind like his own, striving for greater things than everyday  life in a small town. 

 

And those people found him. 

 

It was nothing like he’d imagined. They put weapons in his hands and fear in his head. They gave him power first, and then a direction. He didn’t fully understand that direction, but they seemed to know more about the supernatural than he did. He trusted them. Nolan became a hunter. 

 

_ ‘We’re going to be the ones to save this town,’  _ they said. 

 

_ ‘We’re going to save humanity.’  _

 

A hero was what he wanted to be. A savior. He was going to save the world from monsters. Instead, Nolan turned into a monster himself. 

 

He’s not a monster anymore. He saw the truth before the war had even really begun, but it was a difficult thing to get out of. It left him trembling, and with blood on his hands that was hard to wash off. Long after he’d gotten rid of all visible traces, guilt was torturing him. 

 

Guilt is what keeps him awake still. 

 

He didn’t fall victim to the war he’d helped start. He didn’t even get hurt. He wasn’t chased away. 

 

He was forgiven. 

 

By Liam, and by the rest of Scott McCall’s werewolf pack. By his former classmates. By his parents. By everyone, but himself. 

 

Guilt feels like it’s crushing him, but from the pieces it leaves, he builds himself anew, and makes sure that he will be good. 

 

Every day, he tries. The new Nolan is kind and generous. He puts others first. He thinks before he makes stupid mistakes. He treats every life like it’s more important than his own. 

 

Every night, he gives up. He looks at the moon and knows that he’s too late. There’s light even in the darkness, but it’s not enough. He can change all he wants, but his past actions will not be undone, and the lives that are lost will forever stay that way. 

 

The new Nolan still looks like the old one, and from the outside, nobody can tell the difference. 

 

He was forgiven, but nobody forgets. 

 

They know what he did, and he won’t be trusted again. He’s not one of the bad guys anymore, but nobody’s going to believe him the opposite either. He’s nobody. He’s alone with his tears under the stars of the night. The colder it gets, the better Nolan feels about it. 

 

He settles down on the bleachers and looks across the empty lacrosse-field. Because Liam insisted, they became co-captains for the rest of high school, but everybody looked up at Liam, and Nolan, much like everyone around him, was only waiting for it to be over. 

 

Nobody asked about the places he was going to go when they graduated. Nobody cares that he’s still alive. Nobody’s scared of him anymore, but nobody wants to give him a second chance either. Nobody knows that he’s a different person now. Nobody’s paying close enough attention to notice. 

 

“You’ll get sick.” 

 

Nolan jumps a little and turns his head so search for the voice that just interrupted his thoughts, but there’s nobody. He isn’t hallucinating now, is he? He hasn’t sunk that low, has he? 

 

“Hello?” Nolan asks into the night. It’s dark, but he should definitely be seeing the person who clearly just commented on the fact that he’s shivering from the cold. 

 

It’s silent, but somehow, although he doesn’t know how, Nolan can feel the presence of another person. He closes his eyes and strains his ears. Seeing isn’t much help in the dark, but with his senses more focused, he can definitely make out that someone’s breathing not far from him. 

 

Why would anybody else be at the same place in the middle of the night though? 

 

“Are you hurt?” Nolan wants to know. “Are you in trouble? Do you need help?” 

 

“No, um, thanks.” 

 

Nolan is pretty sure that this time, the words came from somewhere to his left. And he’s pretty sure that he knows the voice that spoke them. 

 

“You’re safe from me, you know,” he says. 

 

“I know,” comes the instant reply, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I should have stayed quiet.” 

 

Nolan knows who he is. Of course he knows. He hasn’t seen him in a long time, but that doesn’t mean he’s forgotten the smile that puts the sun to shame or that twinkle in his beautiful eyes. Back when they went to school together, he would sometimes close his eyes in class to focus completely on the boy’s voice. It was a rare occurrence that he spoke during class, which only made the few moments more precious for Nolan. 

 

“What are you doing out here?” 

 

Not that he expects an answer, but Nolan wants to know. He wants to know what reason a pure soul could have to be awake at this hour. 

 

“Nothing. I just sit here and think.” 

 

Eyes still shut, Nolan nods. He gets it. He does the same thing. He just wasn’t aware he was sharing the bleachers. 

 

“Insomnia?” 

 

Nolan doesn’t judge. Even if he himself has a different reason, the result stays the same. He can relate. 

 

“Not really. I could be in bed sleeping right now, but I chose not to.” 

 

“Why?” Nolan asks. If he found sleep easily, he would take it. 

 

“I have to take care of someone.” 

 

The voice is soft, gentle. A shudder goes through Nolan. He feels strangely vulnerable. 

 

“Who?” 

 

He shouldn't be asking. It’s none of his business. 

 

“You.” 

 

Nolan’s eyes open. He looks right at the spot slightly to his left where he’s absolutely sure the voice is coming from, but there’s nothing there, nothing his eyes can catch. 

 

“Corey,” he whispers. “Corey, what do you mean?” 

 

“You know what I mean.” 

 

The air stirs where Corey has made himself invisible, and then the spot turns a little blurry. There’s an almost not audible buzzing sound, and all of a sudden, Corey is sitting not far from him on the bleachers, cheeks tinted in a bright pink, eyes wide open. 

 

“I don’t understand,” Nolan mutters. 

 

He knew what a chimera was, and he knew that Corey could make himself invisible. He knew that he’s spied on people like that before. But why on him? He’s long stopped being a threat to anyone. 

 

Corey shakes his head a little, looks at him, sighs. He parts his lips to say something, thinks better of it, lifts his hands, lets them sink again, folds them in his lap. He purses his lips, stares. 

 

“I see you, you know.” Those are the words that finally make it out of his mouth. Nolan doesn’t follow. 

 

“I’ve always seen you,” Corey continues. “On the first day of high school, and every day from then on. I saw you when you were a skinny kid with a knack for physics, and on that day when you tried out for the lacrosse team. I saw you struggling to fit in, and I saw you succeeding.” 

 

Nolan averts his eyes, looks to the ground. “Then you saw all my worst mistakes.” 

 

Corey hesitates a few seconds before he speaks. “I did. I remember the time you tried to expose as many supernaturals as possible at school. I was so scared.” 

 

Nolan swallows thickly. Why did Corey wait two years to accuse him of that? To sneak up on him in the middle of the night and then twist the knife a little? 

 

“You were scared too,” Corey says. “That’s why it all happened in the first place. You didn’t know better. And as soon as you did, you changed. I’ve seen that too. All the nights out here. I’ve been hoping you’d stop. You don’t need to do this anymore. You’re a good person. And yet, you keep punishing yourself.” 

 

Nolan shakes his head. “I’m not punishing myself. I’m moving on.” 

 

“You call that moving on?”

 

Corey’s gentle tone doesn’t match the question he’s posing. Nolan shrugs. He doesn’t have a convincing answer. 

 

“We’re not in high school anymore, Nolan. And yet you keep coming back here almost every night. You’re not siding with the bad guys anymore, so what do you push everyone else away for?” 

 

Nolan stares at his hands. “How do you know?” 

 

“Because I come here every night too,” Corey answers truthfully. Like it’s a normal thing to admit. Like it’s a normal thing to be doing. Like honesty comes easy to him. 

 

Nolan doesn’t want to ask. No. He doesn’t want to hear the answer, doesn’t want it to be true. Corey is different. Corey is pure. Corey should hate him for everything he did. 

 

Corey doesn’t need prompting though. 

 

“Do you know that feeling when a need is growing inside you?” He asks, looking at Nolan, searching for something in his eyes, holding his gaze, not allowing him to run. “When it starts really small and you think you can live without it, you’ll be fine, but then days pass, weeks, months. Maybe even years. And you can’t get rid of that feeling. On the contrary, it actually gets stronger. You tell yourself you’ll sit it out but you’re helpless. And then you realize that it’s consuming you.” 

 

Nolan is shaking like a leaf by now, and it has nothing to do with the cold. It’s like Corey popped up to crack him open, to help himself to Nolan’s darkest secrets as if it’s the easiest thing to do, like all the burying inside and the bottling up was for nothing. Corey is powerful enough to do that, to look right through and inside him, inside his soul, to take him apart. It hurts, but with every piece, Nolan wants to beg him to take another. 

 

“Yeah,” Nolan says. “I think I know that feeling.” 

 

“What is it that you  _ need _ , Nolan?” 

 

It’s hard to put a name on it, Nolan thinks. The list is so long. There are a thousand nice things, warm feelings that he’s considered out of his reach for so long that he doesn’t know which one he misses the most. 

 

“To be normal, I think.” 

 

What Corey does with his face is half a smile and half a frown. It’s sad but gentle, calm and reassuring. It shakes Nolan to the core, and suddenly he thinks that what he  _ needs  _ might be a hand to hold in his own.

 

“You made a mistake. You regret it. You learned from it. You did better. How much more normal do you think you can get? What else do you  _ need _ ?” 

 

“To not be alone.” 

 

This time, Corey gives him a smile. It’s not as big and bright as he’s seen it on Corey before, but it’s special. 

 

“You haven’t been alone on a single night in the past two years,” he says. 

 

Nolan takes him in. He closes his eyes and looks again, tries to find something he’s missed before. A clue he needs to figure out who Corey is. All he sees it what he’s always seen, a person who’s beautiful inside and out. Hands that have never hurt anyone, that are made for holding on and building up and being tender. A heaving and sinking chest with a heart of gold inside. Pink lips that speak words with great care, always to do good with them. And the eyes. Corey’s eyes. 

 

“Why?” Nolan asks. “Why would you do that? Why would you care?” 

 

“Because it’s what  _ I  _ need,” Corey says. Simple words, but they don’t make sense to Nolan. 

 

“What? To look after me?” 

 

“To see you,” Corey says. “To not be alone. To make sure you’re taking care of yourself. I’m sorry I’ve been doing that. It’s creepy, I know. I was going to stop worrying. I was going to sit it out, get over you. Move on. I guess we’re both bad at that.” 

 

Nolan doesn’t know what to say, and he can’t hear his own thoughts over the thumping of his heartbeat. He can’t see anything because tears are welling up in his eyes and he can’t do anything because he’s busy trying to hold them in.

 

“I was in love with you, you know,” he finally says, although he almost chokes on his confession. “But that was another life.” 

 

Corey shakes his head. Without words, he lets Nolan know how strongly he disagrees, but Nolan needs to be right about this, because it’s getting dangerous, because he’s laid bare, and Corey has him in his hands, and he won’t survive it of Corey breaks him right now. 

 

He’s losing. 

 

Corey comes closer, and Nolan can press his eyes shut all he wants, because his scent is in the air, and his body is warm next to his own, and there’s an electric jolt when Corey’s finger brushes Nolan’s hand, and when he takes it and holds it, properly holds it, fingers entangled, palms pressed together, Nolan is defeated. 

 

He can’t stop himself from needing anymore. 

 

He needs to be close to someone in spite of the risk to hurt them. He needs to hold on to someone although they might let go of him. He needs to be pulled back up when he lets himself fall. Every day, he’s fine. Every night, he needs to hear that there lies hope in the future. 

 

“It’s okay,” Corey whispers, his arms wide and open, waiting for Nolan to lean on his shoulder. “It’s not another life. If it was, it would be so much easier. It’s not easy, Nolan. That’s how you know you’re doing it right.” 

 

Nolan needs to be held. 

 

He is, for minutes, one after the other ticking away has he tries to breathe calmly, his face buried against Corey’s neck. 

 

Nolan needs to cry. 

 

He does, letting everything out until there’s nothing left inside of him and when Corey tilts his chin up, Nolan can finally smile back at him. Probably not nearly as beautifully as Corey does, but it counts for a start even in his own book. 

 

Nolan needs to make peace with a certain part of his past, needs to leave it behind on the high school bleachers and go. 

 

He does, walking next to Corey, who decided to forgive him long before Nolan decided to forgive himself, because Corey is smarter and kinder, but late will forever be better than never. 

 

Nolan needs to go home to get sleep, and he does that too, not on his own, but with Corey, who doesn’t even talk about where they go, because at night, they need to be together. He’s standing right behind Nolan, arms slung around him, leaned against his back as Nolan unlocks the door. 

 

He turns around for one last look at the stars that have been his only company for the longest time. Corey’s eyes are more important though, and prettier to look at. Nolan takes his face in both hands, cupping his cheeks, hoping his touches are half as gentle as Corey’s are as he caresses them with his thumbs. 

 

He needs a kiss. 

 

Corey looks into his eyes like he’s seeing him, and then nods just lightly. 

 

“I need it too,” he whispers, breath catching against Nolan’s lips. 

 

This time, as he’s shaking, it’s because he’s got the most precious thing he can imagine right in front of him, and he still has to learn how to not break it. Because if Corey doesn’t mean what he’s saying, it will tear him apart, and the brushing of their lips couldn’t hold a greater meaning. Because new beginnings are scary, and he needs one so badly that it’s almost not bearable. 

 

It’s almost killing him, the tension right before the kiss, when their eyes are closed and their foreheads pressed together, their hands nervously holding on, tugging at shirts. Being close to Corey means that there’s a whole new world he’s got to lose now, and it’s too big, too much, too overwhelming, too… 

 

Until it’s not, because their mouths are pressed together and they’re kissing, and Nolan isn’t the old Nolan or the new one, he’s just Nolan, just a boy kissing another boy, and that’s all there is, because what else would there be room for right now?  

 

Because his knees are weak and he’s forgetting how to breathe, Nolan pulls back, but Corey doesn’t let go of him, and then they kiss again, softly.

 

They stop before their kissing can turn into anything else than that.

 

“Wow,” Nolan breathes, “I…” 

 

He had no idea. 

 

He really needed that, but he has no time to think about how badly, because now he already needs more things, and they’re all Corey-related, and they’re multiplying by the second. 

 

Corey looks up and gives him a smile. 

 

“Yeah,” he says, “me too.” 


End file.
